UPDATE: Is is now totally unraveled. The person related to the culling license speaks out, see below.
I feel there will be more crow pie coming on the menu for David Appell and Nick Stokes.
Simon from Australian Climate Madness writes:
This is turning into the story that keeps on giving. After yesterday’s revelation that the one possible “threat” was actually an innocent discussion about culling kangaroos, now Legal Affairs editor Chris Merritt writes in The Weekend Australian:
Media Watch eyes climate scientist death threat claims
AFTER triggering a global news event with reports about death threats against climate scientists, the ABC and Fairfax Media are under investigation by Media Watch after a central plank supporting their reports was found to be non-existent.
Before the flaws in their reports were revealed, their versions of the truth had been picked up by Britain’s The Guardian and the scientific journal Nature.
The critical error in their reports, which has been revealed by The Australian, is that emails held by the Australian National University that were supposed to outline death threats against climate scientists have been independently assessed as containing no death threats.
Those emails were made public on Tuesday after a long Freedom of Information campaign by blogger Simon Turnill.
Full story here
============================================================
UPDATE: On the website “Catalaxy Files” and in comments on WUWT below, the person who is at the center of the alleged “death threat” months before the other emails, identifies himself. Link.
Read it from the beginning here: http://catallaxyfiles.com/2012/05/10/the-dog-ate-my-death-threats-with-garcinia cambogia-ii/
Here’s the comment left on WUWT:
I feel I can now throw some light on the matter. The document viewed as most “threatening” referred to an alleged Deliberation at the ANU about climate change in the Canberra region at which one person “made a death threat” (sic) by showing his gun licence and boasting about his skill as a sniper.. Only two people dropped out of the conference only one of those who did so attended the even meal. Me. I am certainly the one who is alleged to show someone their gun licence. That is not true while at the evening meal (of poor quality) comments moved to eating game meat and I was approached by the Commissioner for the Environment ACT, Dr Maxine Cooper who recognized me as someone involved in the kangaroo culling program in the ACT. She politely asked if she could sit at the vacant seat next to me and asked if I had past the recent licence test – not easy. I replied yes and showed her my current licence. I also impressed on any one interested the high standard of marksmanship necessary to allay any cruelty concerns. I might add that earlier in the day I had challenged two speakers to comment on a letter in the Canberra Times that claimed that temperatures had not increased in the Canberra area for decades. They were unable to do so, having not apparently checked the record despite the the “Deliberation” (conference) supposed to be about rising temperatures in the Canberra region. As all daytime conversations were recorded (we all signed waivers to allow this) this can easily be checked.
I note Readfearn has commented on the “death threat at the conference” in Crikey ,com. He got one thing right I did leave of my own accord. When meal had finished and a piss poor meal it was.
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John Coochey says: May 14, 2012 at 1:33 pm
First, John, thank you for your obvious integrity.
John, with respect, the threats are typically not limited to one’s income, they are (sometimes) to one’s life.
Regarding threats of violence and actual acts of violence, I do know of some, but all of these were directed at global warming skeptics. Dr. Tim Ball has received several death threats and has gone public. Other “skeptic” scientists who have been the victims of actual violence do not want their names or stories mentioned, and I must respect that – but it has been a very “dirty” war.
The problem is that the far left has adopted global warming as a sacred “Cause”, to be defended by their brownshirts with vehemence and violence against all intellectual challenges.
To understand the history of eco-extremism, you may wish to read this essay by Patrick Moore, a co-founder of Greenpeace. It is no accident that this was written in 1994, five years after the fall of the Berlin Wall.
http://www.greenspirit.com/key_issues/the_log.cfm?booknum=12&page=3
The scientific failure of the global warming alarmists’ case is evidenced by the utter failure of their predictive record. Not one of their very-scary global warming predictions has materialized. There has been no net global warming for 10-15 year, but this does not deter the global warming fanatics – the shepherds just change their story, and the sheep just follow.
I just heard from Media Watch and it looks like they are going to run some sort of story on Monday. The said I was not a central issue but did not say what was. For you who are not in Australian Media Watch is an ABC news program which used to specialise in covering poor or biased coverage in the media. It is now however about as politically correct as you can get especially about AGW. Will be interesting to see what they do with it
I have just seen the story by Media Watch and even by their own standards it was a disgrace running an argument along the lines “because we have not seen every document available (or not) from every university in the country, especially the ANU then we should not comment” Well guess what? An Freedom of Information request has just gone in. Media Watch promised me they would link to a brief note I sent them. It does not seem to be there
In what might be the final rap up some alarmist like the Australian Broadcasting Commission’s Media Watch have tried to focus on a “death threat” not contained in the ANU emails. It mentions chasing someone down the street with burning brands. This featured in an insert in the original Canberra Times article. Its earliest appearance was traced by the Australian newspaper to an ABC blog, the drum and an article by Clive Hamilton, an alarmist Professor of Public Ethics (whatever that is) and was allegedly made to an activist, not scientist. He did not respond to requests for authentication by the Australian. I believe he is currently located at Oxford.